[Ads-l] "Boxed" adj > "box"

[Ben Zimmer]

I doubt that "box score" originated as "boxed score" -- in the baseball
context, it was "box score" from early on. OED is no help (thanks to its
relatively weak coverage of baseball terms). Merriam-Webster dates "box
score" to 1899, while Dickson's Baseball Dictionary cites a 1908 article by
Edward J. Nichols in Baseball Magazine that says the term is derived "from
the old newspaper custom of placing the data in a boxed-off section on the
page." Henry Chadwick is credited with developing the modern baseball box
score in 1859 in the New York Clipper, but evidently it took a while for
the innovation to get its name.

In a 2010 thread, Bill Mullins and Dan Goncharoff shared examples from June
1896.

http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2010-May/099052.html

Here are two from a month earlier:

---
Birmingham (Ala.) State Herald, May 14, 1896, p. 1, col. 4
Read the results and figure over the box score and see what Birmingham did
for Atlanta yesterday.
https://newspaperarchive.com/sports-clipping-may-14-1896-1584884/
---
Birmingham (Ala.) State Herald, May 28, 1896, p. 2, col. 5
Following is the box score and summary.
https://newspaperarchive.com/sports-clipping-may-28-1896-1584898/
---


On Tue, Mar 10, 2020 at 10:23 AM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> And surely "box score" was once similar?
>
> JL
>
> On Tue, Mar 10, 2020 at 10:17 AM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > How 'bout the well established "box wine"?
> >
> > JL
> >
> > On Tue, Mar 10, 2020 at 9:43 AM Mark Mandel <markamandel at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> >> We've all been seeing "box set" (of a trilogy, set of CDs, etc.) for a
> >> long
> >> time. I've never liked it, but /bɔkssɛt/ is an unsurprising elision from
> >> /bɔkstsɛt/.
> >>
> >> But this morning I see in the current (April(!)) issue of *Consumer
> >> Reports
> >> On Health* , p.7, top of the 3rd column
> >> "One drawback of canned and box soups: sodium."
> >>
> >> It's the same cluster reduction, /bɔ*kst*sup/ > /bɔ*kss*up/. It's just
> the
> >> first I recall seeing other than "... set".
> >>
> >>

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